What is truth? Truth is defined by Webster as " the real state of things" or as an "agreement with fact or reality by a statement". These definitions are all well and good for the lamens use. The question, however, is what is truth philosophically speaking. Truth is a very rich subject as it is at the root of all philosophy including topics such as theory of knowledge, the theory of meaning, belief, reality as well as broader subjects such as idealism (Kantian and Berkleyian ), Lockean Empiricism, Transcendental idealism, Thoreau's Self-Reliance, the pragmatism of Peirce, Dewy,and James, as well as the neo-pragmatism of Quine. When men search for the truth they are trying to express facts as close to that of reality as our language, meanings and terminologies will allow. Before American philosophy, truth was sought after in objective and subjective forms as well as making distinctions for synthetic and analytic truths (objective and subjective meaning as they are and as they seem to us, using perhaps solid and hot as examples, while synthetic and analytic refer to modes of knowledge, empirical and logistical , respectively). American Philosophy focuses on the interests and perspectives of man and puts the idea of truth in correlation with himself. This text hopes to be a brief introduction to the work of American philosophers and their ideas of truth
Perhaps the first American philosopher to challenge the rationalist idea of truth was Ralph Waldo Emerson. In his essay,Nature II on the subject of idealism Emerson freed himself from the shackles of Rationalism with the words ," It is ideal to me, so long as I can't try the accuracy of my senses." This is no revelation by any means, but is a firm first step for the idea of truth in American philosophical thought. Though Emerson is an idealist, it is easy to see the roots of pragmatism in the aforementioned statement. Emerson also wrote such famous quotes as "poetry comes closer to vital truth than history." Emerson's ideas of Nature, Beauty, Spirit and discipline credited the world of our existence as holding truths that were much deeper than science could ever find. He believed the harmony of the system was the real truth and that understanding of one's self in accordance with the system would reveal that truth to you. When truth is thought of in that respect, ethical ideologies and belief come into the picture and are seemingly almost inseparable from the Truth.
The priorly stated point leads us to another question: Is truth and justice one and the same thing? The answer isn't a clear one. An American philosophical working definition of Individualism, however, does go as thus, "Individualism is the belief that individuals are the primary source of truth and goodness and society is only truthful and good as it conforms to or respects the individual." This definition is offered as an example. If a person were to substitute the words "justice" and "just" for the words truth and truthful in the statement above would the idea change at all? This is a question for real philosophers or perhaps for Merriam-Webster but the point is clear. Truth is closely related to justice and (Though unrelatable by the statement) driven by belief.
Truth and justice,when walking hand in hand, will almost inevitably lead man into utilitarianism, for the formation of beliefs (belief being defined as something a man will act upon). Justice is a formation of beliefs that should allow fairness to be enforced. Political philosopher William Paley's utilitarianism states that, "We should obey the law unless it is convenient for all society too not." So is truth (or justice) in American philosophical terms about equality, discipline and harmony as related to man and the world or is truth simply empirical. Oliver Wendell Holmes (Supreme Court Justice and member of Peirce and James' Metaphysical club) says, "the life of the law has not been logic, but experience. The felt necessities of the time, the prevalent moral and political theories, intuitions of public policy , avowed or unconscious, eventhe prejudices which judges share with their fellow men, have a good deal more to do than syllogism in determining the rules by which men should be governed."
In saying such O.W.Holmes has bridged the American Judiciary system (American justice) with the pragmatism of Willian James and Charles Peirce. While James did believe in the "Sentiment of Rationality" (truth is to find proof by rational means) he would be quick to point out that ,"truth is determined by human standards from a human perspective."
James'theory of truth is stated as such," Ideas become true just so far as they help us get into satisfactory relations with other parts of our experience." So stated truth is a function. From James' perspective pragmatism is empirical because it searches for truth in experienced results. James also realised that there could be more than one explanation for empirical results, therefore he introduced hypotheses for testing truth. The hypotheses were based on belief once empirical evidence was exhausted and there was no intellectual reason to doubt a hypothesis. Once this point was reached whatever hypothesis which suited your needs was the tue one. If more data was found then the truth would change according to the depth of our prior knowledge and how the new data could be incorporated into the system of our beliefs. So in that way James stayed true to his belief that "Ideas become true just so far as they help us get into satisfactory relations with other parts of our experience." James understood the weaknesses of is ideology and summed up his motivation to settle on what we believe (that's not really fair, What we theorize after great scrutiny) as the truth in his theory of absolute truth. He so states 'the absolutely true, meaning what no further experience will ever alter, is that ideal vanishing point towards which we imagine that all our temporary truths will someday converge. It runs on all fours with the perfectly wise man and with the absolutely complete experience, and if these ideals are ever realized, they will all be realized together. Meanwhile we have to live today by what truth we can get today,and be read tomorrow to call it falsehood."
Those words from James make a suitable introduction to the ideas of Charles Peirce. The Peircean Theory of Truth is as such: "truth is that which all scientific investigators are destined to ultimately agree," To be true is to offer proper codes of conduct. William James offers,"Truth is one species of good, and not, as is usually supposed, a category distinct from good, and coordinate with it." In Peircean thought you would play the good by the numbers. Peirce believed," The concept of probability refers to the frequency that an inference will turn out to be true if its premise is true. "Rolling a die has a 1/6 inference on all sides. This is true only if the action is continued repeatedly and indefinitely. And so in science. Peirce believed that there was one truth: ultimate agreement. So it must be continually repeated by scientists again and again to get ultimate agreement. Where does ultimate agreement lie and how do we find it? Play it by the odds!! (or your intuition).
It is at this point that truth crosses into knowledge. It does so since we can't fine James' absolute truth and because Peirce's darn scientists won't ever agree. Knowledge is to be defined as what we know. The truth is what we know to probably work best. Emerson begs that you look at poetical theory, and Peirce cries for the scientific method. William James tells us every wise man know it takes both. The truth is human and mechanical, a neverending search for meaning. As any judge can tell you (ask Oliver Wendell Holmes perhaps) the truth is "to the best of my knowledge,your honor."
Creighton Casey